American Carnage

If you???re looking for an inside view of the Republican schism between populist and Never Trump wings, this is a pretty solid book, with occasionally pithy writing. If, like me, you want to explore the ???paranoid style??? from the John Birch Society onwards, you???re going to be underwhelmed. Basically it???s a view of the rise of the Tea Party through the first few years of Trump???s presidency from a Never Trump perspective, valuable in its own way but hardly the social or political commentary I was hoping for.

The value of this book is as a distillation of reporting spanning the last 10+ years of US national politics. If you're looking for bombshells or new facts, then you're likely to be disappointed. But if you're looking for something that will connect the dots between the sometimes seemingly disconnected events, this is a great review of recent history.

I also appreciate that it isn't a partisan screed against Trump – although his supporters may see it that way. The author calls out Trump's strengths and abilities in plain, unapologetic language, just as he does Trump's flaws.